Translating Hollywood: the World of Movie Posters
By Anonymous
TRANSLATING HOLLYWOOD: THE WORLD OF MOVIE POSTERS by Sam Sarowitz Think of your favorite movie poster. Consider what it is about the design that appeals to you: Does the representation really have much to do with the content of the film, or does it resonate for some other reason? Just as with most marketing messages, promotional movie posters vary depending on the target audience. What works in one country may be deemed offensive, ineffective or just plain incomprehensible in another part of the world. Translating Hollywood: The World of Movie Posters provides readers with what may well be a unique opportunity to compare concepts for the same film side-by-side.
Selected from author Sam Sarowitz’s Soho-based Posteritati Gallery collection of more than 12,000 examples, the featured posters are for older U.S. classics like Citizen Kane and The Birds as well as more modern gems like Blue Velvet, Taxi Driver and Reservoir Dogs. While American films make up the bulk of the work shown, movies from others parts of the world are represented as well. Short write-ups accompanying the posters help put the various treatments into context.
Translating Hollywood: The World of Movie Posters includes work from the ’40s through the ’90s, with films organized by decade. And while the visuals alone make the book worth buying, the real value is in comparing the astonishingly different posters promoting the same movie. As noted in the introduction, “This book demonstrates the varied approaches to advertising a film through printed media. More than about selling a film, these posters from all over the world embody the cultural tendencies of the respective countries, making for fascinating case studies about how information is disseminated visually and digested, and the responses they generate.”
Pounds 45, hardcover, 160 pages, Mark Batty Publisher (www.markbattypublisher.com)
Copyright Dynamic Graphics, Inc. Jul/Aug 2008
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